


Selections from the Life of an Inventor (and his Ghost)

by coldairballoons



Category: Edgar Allan Poe's Murder Mystery Dinner Party (Web Series)
Genre: Canonical Character Death, F/M, Falling In Love, Friends to Lovers, Inspired by Music, Love Confessions, Mutual Pining, Pining, Romance, Too Many Music Metaphors, Yearning
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-11
Updated: 2020-07-11
Packaged: 2021-03-05 06:15:53
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,637
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25199878
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/coldairballoons/pseuds/coldairballoons
Summary: H.G. Wells was certainly not the type to fall in love.He never expected Lenore.
Relationships: H.G. Wells/Lenore
Comments: 4
Kudos: 22





	Selections from the Life of an Inventor (and his Ghost)

**Author's Note:**

  * For [my Lenore.](https://archiveofourown.org/gifts?recipient=my+Lenore.).



It was odd, this game of theirs they played.

A twirling, waltzing denial that hit both deeply and far too personally, a dance around the edges of friendship and romance, bordering on some unspoken, un-acted upon desire for closeness.

H.G. Wells was certainly not the type to fall in love. After all, he was an inventor. A scientist, focusing on factual information. The statistics, the numbers, the screws and bolts and wires holding together a machine that ran in such a certain way. 

He decided far too young that romance simply wasn’t for him, and stuck with it, throughout his childhood and adolescence, his years as a young man at university, his years of writing and thoughts and ideas.

He never expected Lenore.

The two of them were two notes in harmony. Clicking instantly with the other, creating a sort of beautiful echoing presence that could be denied by no man. 

When he first met Lenore, H.G. was… starstruck. That blossoming feeling within your heart when you hear a familiar swell of strings in your favorite song overtook his every sense, and he fell almost instantly, despite his better judgement.

Some measly part of his brain, the logical side, of course, was complaining. Filling his mind with doubts.

“She’ll never love you.” His mind insisted. “She’s an angel. You, you’re a mere mortal.”

But nevertheless, they played this game. This dancing, dodging arpeggio, leaving spaces in between. Looks lingering just a moment too long, hands brushing as she passed a handful of wires to him, a small smile shared, as though it was a secret. 

There was an eternity between them. A director holding their baton in suspense.

Then, the shattering crash. Somewhere, between the hissing of smoke entering the attic, his coughs, wheezing, calling out for Lenore, the ticking of clocks in the back of his mind, he realized that this was it. His final crescendo.

Lenore pulled H.G. onto her lap, trying to steady his breathing, but it was too late. The tempo rose, then dropped, and his hand, clutching hers, fell.

An eternity passed, but when the strings began to swell once more, that ticking of clocks, the metronome to his heartbeat, he opened his eyes. And no, his first thought wasn’t in reference to his obvious displacement, how his throat ached, where he was, floating in this… grey void. 

His first thought was more along the lines of, “Lenore?”

H.G. Wells made it his mission. A mission to regain that dance, to break through those stops and silences and recreate that echo, that seemed so far away. 

And so he worked. He worked tirelessly, though, in this void, devoid of time, space, existence, he perhaps shouldn’t have felt that exhaustion… but nevertheless, he persevered. He worked, worked, worked, for so long that his hands, forever sooty and stained and calloused, grew sore.

Lenore, his guiding star. His light in the darkness, in the void of nothingness.

Guided by her words, her touch, her smile, her laugh, H.G. twisted the final few gears into place, sitting back and admiring his work for just a moment, before flipping some switches, setting a dial or two, then inhaling, pressing a button.

There was silence for a moment. Then, it was as though all of time was folding in on itself, and H.G. Wells disappeared from the void, leaving just a slightly singed scrap of paper behind.

It was curling at the edges, the ink bleeding, but legible.

“To Lenore,  
How to tell you? How to explain my affections to you in simple words spoken aloud?  
Oh, how I desire to tell you. Tell you precisely how I feel for you.  
I cannot, I’m afraid. Which is why I leave you this note.  
I love you.  
You’ll never read this.  
But I do.  
Ever yours,  
H.G. Wells”

Time travel is a finicky thing. It takes you places and times you can never quite explain. As with music, it has a way of changing, despite your best efforts. H.G. knew that, he knew that well, which is why his heart skipped a beat when he saw Lenore.

Lenore, sitting in the study, smiling. 

And H.G.’s heart broke when she smiled at him. 

“H.G.?”

Oh, if only she knew. Knew that their dance, that twirling whirl of motion and laughter and jokes that only they shared. Her snide remarks, her laughter of windchimes, her fingers, plucking his heartstrings.

“Lenore,” was all he could say, trying his damndest not to run to her, to pull her into a kiss. One that was long-awaited by him, after years, minutes, centuries, seconds of waiting.

Their day passed with idle chit-chat, simple smalltalk. “How was the void,”, “How did you figure out time travel,”, “How’s the afterlife been treating you,”, et cetera. It was so incredibly unlike them that H.G. wanted to cry, but he refrained.

He took to becoming a ghost as a violinist takes to being told to play the trombone. Sloppily at first, but soon, there are similar rhythms, similar notes and markings and soon you’re taking on an entirely new world.

Lenore spent hours with him, teaching him Ghost 101, talking him through ways to best startle Edgar while at work, listening while he explained what his ideas for new inventions and stories and worlds and dangers and impossible possibilities were.

She was such excellent company, H.G. decided one late evening, in the attic, watching her hands flit about like a flute’s carefree melody as she told a story about her life. 

There were many moments where he considered. He considered pulling her aside and telling her precisely how much he loved her. How he wanted to kiss her beneath the moonlight and hold her on those cold nights and dance together in a finally connected, intertwining harmony.

But he didn’t.

Until the night of the storm.

That night, thunder boomed and lightning flashed like some percussive bellow, and H.G. lay alone in his bed, attempting to steady his breathing. His spectral heart’s tempo speeding at each crash of the cymbals of thunder. 

In a flash of lightning, a figure appeared at his doorway, and he startled, making to bolt, only to sigh in relief upon noticing that familiar long hair, the playful smile on her lips.

“Hey, goggles.” Lenore hummed, wincing at the thunder. “You got woken up, too?”

He nodded, a bit shakily, scooting over in his bed to make room for her to sit next to him, which she did. “I’m afraid so, it’s just so terribly… loud.”

Lenore nodded in agreement, leaning her head against his shoulder. This was normal, this was fine. This was them. “Can I tell you a secret?”

“Of course,” H.G. turned to her, frowning. Her hair smelled sweet, tickling against his cheek, and she was so warm, so present, so there against him. “Anything.”

“I think I’m in love with you.” She whispered, almost drowned out over the pouring rain. “I think I’m in love with you and I feel absolutely crazy for it.”

The strings of his heart swelled, a lone pizzicato plucking away. Could… this be real? Was he still dreaming? But then there was another boom of thunder and he gasped, which just urged Lenore to pull him closer, hold him tighter. 

“H.G.?”

He nodded, swallowing. He felt faint, his heart’s relentless plucking and swelling and stopping and starting and the ticking in his mind is incredibly distracting. His mouth felt dry, his throat scratchy.

“I… good.” H.G. stammered, his face far too flushed for his enjoyment. “Good.”

She cocked her head, that smile back. “Good?”

He nodded, and tentatively edged his hand closer to hers. Their pinky fingers brushed against each other, then intertwined, and soon their hands were pressed against each other, so real, so alive. A warmth unlike that of any human.

“I believe I’m in love with you, too, Lenore.” H.G. whispered back, voice low, cautious. A small cellist solo against the cacophony of the storm.

She laughed, breathless. “Good.” 

There was a quiet pause, a breath in between sections of a symphony, then she turned to him, and cupped his jaw, and for a moment he worried his stubble would scratch her gentle hands but then she pulled him to her and slotted their lips together, and everything felt so right.

Lenore tasted like some sweet berry, one so tangible yet so ethereal he couldn’t place it. Her mouth opening just slightly against his to sigh, smiling, her hand coming to tangle in his already messy hair. And if H.G. believed in a heaven, this surely would be it.  


The night passed in a blur. He vaguely remembered kissing, lips on lips, hands on hands, an unsteady harmony growing in confidence until finally, the crescendo, the climax, the taste of Lenore on his tongue, kissing her neck as she laid there, breathing shakily, smiling in the afterglow of something so surreal, something too dreamlike to ever have happened.

“But it did happen.” Lenore whispered, pulling him closer. “We’re here. Real.”

“We’re real.” H.G. whispered right back, kissing the corner of her mouth with a smile. 

And they were. 

In stories, this was when things shifted. Dynamics, tonality, relationships, but for H.G. and Lenore, there was no such shift. They remained themselves, their harmonic notes, joining for great, eternal swells of music.

H.G. was an author, a scientist, an inventor. Facts and fiction were incredibly different things, and despite this, he found himself falling, falling further into this endless repetition of love and adoration for her.

It was odd, this game of theirs they played.

But in the end, perhaps those two endlessly twirling dancers get their happily ever after.

Perhaps.

**Author's Note:**

> Hello!
> 
> This was so fun to write, Wellenore has my entire heart, and it doesn't help that I'm a hopeless romantic and a H.G. kinnie...
> 
> If you have any requests, please ask on Tumblr (coldairballoons), or shoot me a DM on Discord (coldairballoons#9556)! I'm happy to answer!
> 
> Finally, please check out these resources.  
> https://blacklivesmatters.carrd.co/


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